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Show points his finger up the opening between my thigh and the Dove shorts I wear after school and asks What's up there?. One day we listen to John Mellenkemp's "Jack and Diane." We are sitting on the curb in front of our houses; Karen roller "skates up and down the block. I play the song on my new boom box, the first thing I buy with the money I make from delivering The Navy News, forty-nine dollars at the exchange, a lot in 1981. Jen, you know what hurts so good means, don 'tyou, he asks with a grin. Yes, I say, having no idea. You don't know, he responds, laughing at me, You 're such a virgin. Tell me, I say, hoping that my voice sounds like a challenge rather than a plea. In Algebra class I sit in the back and make out with my girlfriend Michelle. The teacher doesn 't even notice. He just goes on teaching. I try to picture Jeff mashing with a girl while his teacher solves for "x," but I am distracted by the jealousy I feel at learning he has a girlfriend. When you make it, it hurts some, he says, but the hurt is good. I look at him, Karen now a ways off, the hum of her skates in the background, and notice his green eyes. Whatever, I say, but what I want is for him to show me. And when I listen to that song again that night I imagine kissing Jeff, imagine a hurt that is good. It is confusing, the way he reels me in and lets me go, sometimes flirting and touching, sometimes too busy to notice. I wait for his notice. One night I spend the night with Karen. Their parents are out for the evening, and 159 |
